...

DAY 81

Another travel day!

Update: Monday, 16-May-2005 7:25 AM

In about 8 hours I have to head out and fly overnight later in the day to Sri Lanka. It's a team building effort as well as a needed rest after several weeks of 60+ hour work weeks.

Of course, I'll keep bloggin away as often as I can. I will be staying at a hotel on the same coast that was devastated by the Tsunami a little over five months ago.

It's also the final days for testing and making sure that all parts of the existing network are ready to go!

It's not the easiest task to work via online tools for most of the year, but in the end, the face-to-face communication helps build rapport and iron out the difference in culture. Most the the problems with programming and other work items have occurred because of basic miscommunications.

As I have noted many times working on a project which could be interpreted 100% correctly, but minor differences in outlook, education and past experience lead to a situation where the programmers end up developing functions that are not needed or function entirely different.

To make a long story short the description goes out to build a very nice looking horse. And I get back a very complicated looking elephant. In a sense my travel is to make sure these types of events are avoided as the network grows.

Perhaps, my last gripe regarding issues working with these guys is 'timing'. For me when a problem has occurred and a solution is needed, that need is ASAP. My definition of ASAP (as soon as possible) is with in the day. IF it's 9:PM and I was to find out there was a network problem, ASAP would mean that my day would continue until the problem was solved.

I have learned from past experience that ASAP could be a day or two, and in the Internet world, that is far too long to work with. Applications must work 24/7 and where there is a problem, it must be resolved in minutes.

Perhaps, more importantly, a problem must be resolved and made sure that it's not repeated.

These are the kind of challenges that I need to communicate and make sure that they are not reoccurring challenges that eventually turn into a plague.

I need to communicate that. I hope I can... Off to see the world. Back later. Sam out...

BACK to DAY 80 | TODAY is DAY 81 | NEXT is DAY 82